Lori Wilde - There Goes The Bride (19 page)

The knee, for one thing.

His grandfather’s death, for another.

Delaney’s watch did stop the minute that you met her. Just like the clock on the wall at the party stopped when Nana and Grampa Leo met.

Yes, but that wasn’t the first time he’d ever met her. If it really was the whammy, wouldn’t her watch have stopped when she threw the tarp over his head?

He didn’t have the patience for this whammy nonsense.

“Uncle Nick, the Ching Bada in my Happy Meal broke,” Zack said, handing him the pieces of a cheap plastic toy.

Nick didn’t even know what the hell a Ching Bada was, but from the looks of it, the thing was some kind of weird cartoon character on wheels.

Nick examined the shattered pieces. “Sorry, buddy, but I don’t think I can fix this.”

Zack’s lip pouched out sorrowfully. “But I want it.”

“I know, but sometimes we can’t always have what we want.”

Strange thing, the forlorn expression on his nephew’s face was exactly how he was feeling about Delaney. He wanted her, but he couldn’t have her. The situation was broken beyond his ability to fix it.

One thing was for certain. Time wasn’t on his side. He had to get rid of Delaney and get rid of her fast, before he did something totally stupid. Like fall in love with her.

In order to chase her away, he was going to have to turn up the heat and make sure he checked his heart at the door. He knew of only one way to accomplish his goal. Tackle getting rid of Delaney like she was an assignment. Use the three-pronged approach he’d developed. It had never failed to keep his professionalism in place undercover and his emotions tucked deeply away.

Chapter 10

F
or the rest of the week, Nick and his family worked to move Nana in with Trudie. They put the bulk of her things in storage, leaving only a bare minimum of furniture—at Delaney’s advice—in the house for the staging. Once they had her possessions relocated, they spent the weekend cleaning the place from top to bottom.

By Monday morning, everyone else had gone home. Nana was ensconced at Trudie’s, and Nick was alone at the house. He would be living there during the renovations. It felt hollow and sad with everything gone and the sound of his footsteps bouncing off the vacant walls.

Nana kept insisting this was a new chapter in her life, but to Nick, it felt like an epilogue. As he stared around the bare rooms, a moody thrust of emotions pushed against his throat. The book of his grandmother’s life was coming to a close, and he couldn’t do anything about it. He hated feeling powerless.

This house—and his grandparents’ love—had been the sanctuary that had saved him after his mother died. For the house to go out of the family made him feel as if he were losing both his mom and his grandfather all over again.

Being here alone strengthened his determination to undermine the house renovation process, no matter what it took. With the family dispersed and Delaney on her way over for their first real day of tackling the repairs, Nick paced the kitchen, rehearsing what he’d planned. The initial phase of “Operation: House Stager Ouster, Tactic #1—Know Thy Enemy” was now in play.

Delaney appeared on the doorstep at eight A.M. dressed in a sleeveless floral V-neck tee, flip-flops, and clam-digger-style blue jeans. Her hair was pulled back in a carefree ponytail that swished about her shoulders whenever she moved. She had a sack of bagels and two cups of Starbucks coffee in her hands. The smile on her face wrapped him like an unexpected hug.

“Good morning.” She beamed. “I brought breakfast. We need fuel to start the day.”

Ah, clearly she was a morning person. Nick made a mental note. You never could tell what information would prove useful. “Come on in.”

He held the screen door open and let her in through the mudroom, then led the way into the kitchen. He’d raised all the windows to let in the Gulf breeze—the house had never been equipped with air-conditioning—and while it was cool now, by noon the temperature promised to be in the high eighties.

“It’s just me and you today?”

“Yep.”
And you have no clue what you’re in for.
“No one else can afford any more time off from their jobs. We’re flying solo until the weekend.” He held out his arms and said mischievously, “I’m your crew. Do with me what you will.”

She set the bagels on the kitchen counter. “It looks so empty,” she said. The word “empty” echoed in the room, underscoring her point. “It makes me feel a little sad.”

Nick nodded.
Yeah, try having it be your grandmother’s house and see how that feels.

“I figured you for straight black.” She held out a grande cup of coffee to him. “No fancy blend.”

“You pegged me.” He eyed her. “Let me guess. You’re a low-fat hazelnut latte with artificial sweetener.”

She canted her head. “I guess stereotypes are stereotypes for a reason.”

Reaching out to take the coffee from her, their fingers touched briefly against the cup and he almost fumbled it. Nick was very aware of how close they were standing, but he wanted to move even closer.
Careful. Not too soon. That’s Tactic #2. We’re not there yet.

“Bagel?”

“What kind?”

“Plain, cinnamon-raisin, and poppy seed. Not knowing what you like, I got all three.”

“Plain.”

She took a bagel from the sack. “Cream cheese?”

“Why not?”

She slathered the bagel with cream cheese and then held it out to him. Rather than taking it, Nick boldly leaned over and took a bite of it right out of her hand.

Okay, so he was blurring the edges between Tactic #1 and Tactic #2. It was an intimate gesture calculated to throw her off balance, but as his head went down and Nick got a whiff of her sweet, gentle-smelling cologne, he was the one thrown off.

“You’ve got cream cheese on your chin,” she said as calmly as if men ate from her hand every day of the week.

Nick gulped. Where had his blushing Rosy gone?

She reached over with her thumb, then dabbed his chin with a Starbucks napkin. “There.”

Then Delaney raised the bagel to her mouth and nibbled off a chunk right where he’d bitten into it.

She did it with such finesse he had to wonder if she possessed a few undercover tactics of her own. Blood pooled low in his abdomen. He stood there feeling awkward and unsure of himself, when just seconds before he’d been the one trying to unsettle her. How had she managed to turn the tables on him so swiftly? It was almost as if she knew what he was up to and was secretly paying him back.

She glanced down and he followed her gaze to see her staring at his knee. “Exactly how did you injure it?”

He shrugged. He didn’t like talking about it. “I’d rather not say. It’s sort of embarrassing.”

“Hmm, sounds intriguing.”

“Why, Rose, what in the hell are you thinking? Are you imagining me in a compromising position?” he teased. “Say, busting my knee falling from a chandelier during adventuresome sex?”

“No, I wasn’t.”

Ah, ah, she couldn’t hide it. He saw a pink tinge creeping over her cheeks. He knew it. She wasn’t as bold as she was pretending.

“Sorry, sweetheart. You can’t lie. Your rosy red cheeks give you away.”

“How did you hurt your knee?” she badgered, and he could tell she was determined not to let him get the best of her. He admired that. He made her nervous, but she wasn’t going to let him steamroll her.

“A few months ago someone was assaulting transvestites in south Houston.”

“Don’t tell me you were having kinky sexcapades with a transvestite?” she teased.

He lifted his eyebrows and cocked his most seductive grin her way. “Now, Rosy, that’s just wrong.”

She acted immune—setting down the unfinished bagel, folding her arms over her chest, assessing him mildly. But she didn’t fool him one bit. Nick saw the way her breath quickened, how the pulse at the hollow of her throat jumped.

“I’ve got it.” She snapped her fingers. “You were assigned to dress as a woman, weren’t you?”

“How did you know?”

“What else could make a tough guy like you blush?”

“I’m not blushing,” he denied.

“Yes, you are.”

“My face is turning red because whenever I think about what happened, I get pissed off all over again.”

“Have a temper, do you?”

He snorted. “My captain gave me the assignment as punishment for not following orders on another case. He hates it when I don’t follow orders and still end up making a good clean collar.”

“Oh, you’re one of those kinds of cops.” She picked up her coffee and peered at him over the rim of the cup.

“What kind of cop?”

“The maverick-loose-canyon-Mel-Gibson-
Lethal-Weapon
kind of cop.”

“More like Mel in
Lethal Weapon 3
and
4
. I’m not suicidal. I just don’t like following orders when they’re ill-conceived and could get me or my partner or an innocent bystander killed. And the dress the captain picked out for me to wear, good God, it looked like something from
Boogie Nights.
Cheap, polyester, and sequinned.”

“So what happened?” She leaned in, obviously intrigued. Nick had to admit her interest flattered his ego.

“It’s midnight. In a seedy part of Houston. Dive bars and strip joints and crack houses.” He stopped and looked at her. “You have no idea what that part of town looks like, do you?”

“No,” she confessed. “I’m from River Oaks.”

“Somehow I’d guessed. You’re one of
those
Cartwrights. Richer than God.”

“Yes,” Delaney admitted. “But let’s not get sidetracked by the fact that I’m an oil heiress. About your story. You’re in an unsavory section of the city late at night. Now what?” She took another sip of coffee.

“Don’t you dare laugh.”

She held up two fingers. “Scout’s honor.”

“You were a Girl Scout?”

“No.”

“So your vow not to laugh has no oath to back it up.”

The corners of her lips twitched and her eyes twinkled. “Nope. You’re just going to have to trust me.”

“Okay, here goes. I’m wearing gold lamé spandex, four-inch stilettos, and panty hose. By the way, how in the hell do you women walk around in those damn things? Panty hose are the most god-awful torture device ever invented. The Geneva Convention should have weighed in on those puppies.”

“Next time try a bronzer on your legs instead.”

“Trust me, there ain’t gonna be a next time.”

She laughed.

“It wasn’t funny. And remember, you promised not to laugh.”

“Sorry.” She tried to school her features, but couldn’t completely dampen her smile. “But I would have given anything to see you in that outfit.”

“Trust me, it was ugly. My partner and I are strolling down the street looking like Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis from
Some Like It Hot
and this guy jumps out of the alley, grabs my partner, puts a knife to his throat, and starts dragging him back down the alley.”

Delaney sucked in her breath, splayed hand across her heart, and looked sincerely concerned. “Oh, my goodness.”

“It was a little hairier than oh-my-goodness,” he said. “I went after the guy, but he threatened to stab my partner in the throat if I didn’t step off.”

“What did you do?”

“I threw my purse at the guy’s head. My partner took that opportunity to bite the guy’s wrist. The perp lost his grip on my partner, realized he was in trouble, dropped the knife, and took off down the alley. Stupid me, I just had to go after him. Word to the wise, don’t sprint down a dark alley, in a seedy part of town, wearing four-inch stilettos.”

Delaney hissed in her breath through clenched teeth. “Ouch. I can see where this is headed.”

“Believe me, ouch doesn’t begin to describe the words that came out of my mouth. The guy tried to scale a fence. I jumped to grab for him and came down hard on my right leg. My heel caught on some garbage and slipped out from under me. I had my hands locked around the perp’s ankle when my knee gave way. I heard this horrible crackling sound like an elephant stomping on a big bag of pork rinds. To make matters worse, I pulled the punk down on top of me. What damage the fall hadn’t done, the weight of a two-hundred-pound meth-head finished off. I tore all the ligaments and fractured my kneecap.”

Delaney’s face paled and she made a low noise of sympathy.

“So here I am in the emergency room, gold lamé skirt hiked up to my waist, panty hose twisted around my privates, howling like a werewolf at the moon.”

She reached out a hand and touched his arm. “I’m sorry that happened to you.”

“Hey, don’t be sorry. It wasn’t your fault.” He didn’t want to admit it, but he liked the way her hand felt against his skin. “Your turn.”

“My turn for what?”

“Confession time. I tell you my most embarrassing moment, and you have to tell me yours.” He’d been blabbing away, trying to gain her confidence so she’d confide in him, but so far he hadn’t learned anything personal about her. If Operation: House Stage Ouster was going to work, he had to get her to talk about herself so he could figure out her Achilles’ heel.